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Since this is the thread that took off for feature removal - I'll copy/paste a response I had in another thread that didn't foster more discussion. I've reinst

by Nadya 8y ago

Since this is the thread that took off for feature removal - I'll copy/paste a response I had in another thread that didn't foster more discussion. I've reinstalled a backup I kept of FF 36 - my entire workflow has slowly been gutted over the years. 1) With FF 41 I could no longer set my New Tab page to my Home Page without an add-on. As of Firefox 57 the add-on became buggy if you regularly and quickly try to { Ctrl+T -> Ctrl+L -> Begin typing URL } due to limitations with the Web Extension API. [0] 2) Lost Tab Groups as of FF 45 (the add-on isn't a full replacement of old functionality) 3) Lost many, many, many addons with FF 57 including a very specific tab management that an addon called FireGestures allowed for: using a context menu to navigate my tabs. 4) Lost Bookmark descriptions with FF 62, also lost the Developer Toolbar 5) Now losing Live Bookmarks with FF 64 I no longer recommend FF as the "power user" browser but as the "I dislike Google and want a good browser that isn't Chrome" browser. If you're a power user of some uncommonly used feature, expect it to be removed at some point. I'd love to see how Pocket usage is measured and the statistics of how many people use that trash that they have shoved down users' throats since FF 38. [0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/new-tab-override/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/new-tab-overr...

craftyguy 8y ago
> I've reinstalled a backup I kept of FF 36 Enjoy all those security vulnerabilities you've just exposed yourself to.
- Nadya 8y ago
  If someone manages to place malicious code onto any of the small number of websites I visit, I'm certain the first thing they'd be trying to do is exploit vulnerabilities in software that <0.001% of the site visitors would be using. The more vulnerabilities they attempt to exploit the faster they're going to be noticed so that's a risky gambit. Outside of vulnerabilities related to web browsing, software vulnerabilities rely on new, untrusted code running on my machine and in many cases the exploits rely on someone having physical access to my machine. The threat models just aren't all that relevant to me. The more realistic threat model is software being compromised and the auto-update feature pushing out malicious code to all of the users like what happened with the Transmission BitTorrent Client.
  - kbenson 8y ago
    > The more vulnerabilities they attempt to exploit the faster they're going to be noticed so that's a risky gambit. It seems your entire risk computation is based on the premise that this is true, and that if true how much more likely they are to be noticed is significantly high enough to make it less worth the risk. Do you actually have data to back that up, or are you just going by an assumption? Because to me it seems likely that there are blobs of JS that look for a wide number of vulnerabilities floating around blackhat sites ready to be slightly tweaked for the individual case and then deployed. That's basically the entire premise of what script kiddies are, but with JS, so I don't see why it wouldn't at least be easily available. > The more realistic threat model is software being compromised and the auto-update feature pushing out malicious code to all of the users like what happened with the Transmission BitTorrent Client. That's possible. It would still be interesting to see more of the reasoning on this. I can think of a few things that might mitigate what I think you are referring to, but there's not much by the way of details to address.
    - Nadya 8y ago
      >Do you actually have data to back that up, or are you just going by an assumption? An assumption. The idea is that conducting more malicious activity is generally easier to spot than conducting less malicious activity and trying a wide range of exploits is more likely to be noticed than a smaller, possibly more targeted exploit. Script kiddies attempt a wide range of exploits when they're going after a single target. For example, throwing any and all known vulnerabilities against a website hoping it is hosted with an outdated version of Wordpress in an attempt to gain access. But unless you're going for attention and de-facing the home page, once you're in you want to draw as little attention to what you're doing as possible. OTOH, they might throw everything and the kitchen sink in under the assumption that they'll be caught quickly so they want to capture as much as possible before they're kicked out. >...Because to me it seems likely that there are blobs of JS that look for a wide number of vulnerabilities floating around... I browse with Javascript disabled. I use Tampermonkey and Stylish to inject CSS and Javascript that I write (and therefore trust) to pages I use frequently enough to justify the time spent on restoring certain functionality.
gambler 8y ago
Also, Firefox dev tools cannot capture Web Sockets frame and the add-on that used to do it is currently broken.
mythmon_ 8y ago
This is a very one sided view of the situation. What features were added to the browser during this time period? What was there time to do because these features weren't taking up focus?
- Nadya 8y ago
  It is, but that is because it is tailored to my workflow as a power user who has an unfortunate knack for making use of many of the lesser known features of Firefox. As for new features, nothing that I personally use. Many of these features were removed to pave way for Web Extensions and Quantum and that is justification enough and a direction Firefox needs to move towards if they want to capture the general audience. They are perfectly fine as a browser-that-isn't-Chrome. But they're no longer a browser for Power Users which is what I feel the roots of FF 2 - FF 4 was like. It was a browser for power users, who wanted control over their browser. Now it's a competitor to/alternative of Chrome that's increasingly being simplified and locked down. For example, I can't open a new tab to a website I own because setting the new tab page was used maliciously. There's no way to opt out. That's catering to the general population at the detriment to power users. That's all. It isn't necessarily a bad thing - as iffed as I come off as being.
the_clarence 8y ago
Tree style tabs :/
- kissickas 8y ago
  Tree Style Tabs (the add-on) is one of the two reasons I won't leave FireFox (along with NoScript). It's working fine for me after a bit of setup. What issues are you having?
  - the_clarence 8y ago
    Slow as hell
- Nadya 8y ago
  I used a feature called "[Popup] List All Tabs" from the FireGestures addon. By holding down my Right Mouse Button and scrolling with my scroll wheel, a context menu would appear for me to select a tab or scroll to switch to a tab. This is an example of what it looked like: https://vgy.me/t2KqD7.png https://vgy.me/t2KqD7.png I use this combined with Tab Groups (Ctrl+Shift+E back in the day) to organize tabs into groups to switch between, then use my List All Tabs to switch between tabs in the groups. The only part of that workflow that still exists is Tab Groups. But you can't use Ctrl+Shift+E because that's now used by the "Network" tab of the Dev Tools.
saganus 8y ago
Oh, FireGestures. How I miss that. The speed at which I could switch tabs, close them, open new links without clicking a button felt like magic. Hopefully someone will make something like that for a recent FF version.
- Nadya 8y ago
  Look up Foxy Gestures.
  - saganus 8y ago
    Awesome! Just what I was looking for. Missed this functionality so much! Thanks!
dang 8y ago
Please don't copy/paste from other threads. We're trying to avoid repetition here. In addition, this is offtopic.
- Nadya 8y ago
  Usually I agree with your moderation, even when it has been against me, but this one is either particularly questionable or just poorly worded. It was a partial copy/paste from this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18197886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18197886 which is titled "What happened to my Live Bookmarks?" straight from the horse's mouth. That thread was posted at an awkward time last night and didn't get any discussion. In fact, I was the only one to respond. I try to be transparent when I re-use things I have previously posted, even if I do end up making some pretty significant modifications. The blog linked in this thread is about the removal of this functionality starting in Firefox 64 from a contributor to Mozilla (Gijs) and a brief history of what the feature actually was and the justifications for removing it. I expand upon this feature removal by speaking of previous feature removals that have occurred over the years. I seem to have an uncanny ability of being part of the 0.01% of users who use these poorly (and often never) advertised features. While it is not directly related to the Live Bookmarks it is in relation to Firefox and Feature Removal. The discussion about vulnerabilities of using FF 36 that branched off is admittingly off topic - so if you're pruning this thread as a way to kill that conversation then it's less an action of questionable moderation and more a case of poorly worded moderation.
  - dang 8y ago
    Ok, point taken. And that's not a duplicate comment.

by Nadya 8y ago

craftyguy 8y ago

> I've reinstalled a backup I kept of FF 36 Enjoy all those security vulnerabilities you've just exposed yourself to.

Nadya 8y ago
If someone manages to place malicious code onto any of the small number of websites I visit, I'm certain the first thing they'd be trying to do is exploit vulnerabilities in software that <0.001% of the site visitors would be using. The more vulnerabilities they attempt to exploit the faster they're going to be noticed so that's a risky gambit. Outside of vulnerabilities related to web browsing, software vulnerabilities rely on new, untrusted code running on my machine and in many cases the exploits rely on someone having physical access to my machine. The threat models just aren't all that relevant to me. The more realistic threat model is software being compromised and the auto-update feature pushing out malicious code to all of the users like what happened with the Transmission BitTorrent Client.
- kbenson 8y ago
  > The more vulnerabilities they attempt to exploit the faster they're going to be noticed so that's a risky gambit. It seems your entire risk computation is based on the premise that this is true, and that if true how much more likely they are to be noticed is significantly high enough to make it less worth the risk. Do you actually have data to back that up, or are you just going by an assumption? Because to me it seems likely that there are blobs of JS that look for a wide number of vulnerabilities floating around blackhat sites ready to be slightly tweaked for the individual case and then deployed. That's basically the entire premise of what script kiddies are, but with JS, so I don't see why it wouldn't at least be easily available. > The more realistic threat model is software being compromised and the auto-update feature pushing out malicious code to all of the users like what happened with the Transmission BitTorrent Client. That's possible. It would still be interesting to see more of the reasoning on this. I can think of a few things that might mitigate what I think you are referring to, but there's not much by the way of details to address.
  - Nadya 8y ago
    >Do you actually have data to back that up, or are you just going by an assumption? An assumption. The idea is that conducting more malicious activity is generally easier to spot than conducting less malicious activity and trying a wide range of exploits is more likely to be noticed than a smaller, possibly more targeted exploit. Script kiddies attempt a wide range of exploits when they're going after a single target. For example, throwing any and all known vulnerabilities against a website hoping it is hosted with an outdated version of Wordpress in an attempt to gain access. But unless you're going for attention and de-facing the home page, once you're in you want to draw as little attention to what you're doing as possible. OTOH, they might throw everything and the kitchen sink in under the assumption that they'll be caught quickly so they want to capture as much as possible before they're kicked out. >...Because to me it seems likely that there are blobs of JS that look for a wide number of vulnerabilities floating around... I browse with Javascript disabled. I use Tampermonkey and Stylish to inject CSS and Javascript that I write (and therefore trust) to pages I use frequently enough to justify the time spent on restoring certain functionality.

gambler 8y ago

Also, Firefox dev tools cannot capture Web Sockets frame and the add-on that used to do it is currently broken.

mythmon_ 8y ago

This is a very one sided view of the situation. What features were added to the browser during this time period? What was there time to do because these features weren't taking up focus?

Nadya 8y ago
It is, but that is because it is tailored to my workflow as a power user who has an unfortunate knack for making use of many of the lesser known features of Firefox. As for new features, nothing that I personally use. Many of these features were removed to pave way for Web Extensions and Quantum and that is justification enough and a direction Firefox needs to move towards if they want to capture the general audience. They are perfectly fine as a browser-that-isn't-Chrome. But they're no longer a browser for Power Users which is what I feel the roots of FF 2 - FF 4 was like. It was a browser for power users, who wanted control over their browser. Now it's a competitor to/alternative of Chrome that's increasingly being simplified and locked down. For example, I can't open a new tab to a website I own because setting the new tab page was used maliciously. There's no way to opt out. That's catering to the general population at the detriment to power users. That's all. It isn't necessarily a bad thing - as iffed as I come off as being.

the_clarence 8y ago

Tree style tabs :/

kissickas 8y ago
Tree Style Tabs (the add-on) is one of the two reasons I won't leave FireFox (along with NoScript). It's working fine for me after a bit of setup. What issues are you having?
- the_clarence 8y ago
  Slow as hell
Nadya 8y ago
I used a feature called "[Popup] List All Tabs" from the FireGestures addon. By holding down my Right Mouse Button and scrolling with my scroll wheel, a context menu would appear for me to select a tab or scroll to switch to a tab. This is an example of what it looked like: https://vgy.me/t2KqD7.png https://vgy.me/t2KqD7.png I use this combined with Tab Groups (Ctrl+Shift+E back in the day) to organize tabs into groups to switch between, then use my List All Tabs to switch between tabs in the groups. The only part of that workflow that still exists is Tab Groups. But you can't use Ctrl+Shift+E because that's now used by the "Network" tab of the Dev Tools.

saganus 8y ago

Oh, FireGestures. How I miss that. The speed at which I could switch tabs, close them, open new links without clicking a button felt like magic. Hopefully someone will make something like that for a recent FF version.

Nadya 8y ago
Look up Foxy Gestures.
- saganus 8y ago
  Awesome! Just what I was looking for. Missed this functionality so much! Thanks!

dang 8y ago

Please don't copy/paste from other threads. We're trying to avoid repetition here. In addition, this is offtopic.

Nadya 8y ago
Usually I agree with your moderation, even when it has been against me, but this one is either particularly questionable or just poorly worded. It was a partial copy/paste from this thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18197886 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18197886 which is titled "What happened to my Live Bookmarks?" straight from the horse's mouth. That thread was posted at an awkward time last night and didn't get any discussion. In fact, I was the only one to respond. I try to be transparent when I re-use things I have previously posted, even if I do end up making some pretty significant modifications. The blog linked in this thread is about the removal of this functionality starting in Firefox 64 from a contributor to Mozilla (Gijs) and a brief history of what the feature actually was and the justifications for removing it. I expand upon this feature removal by speaking of previous feature removals that have occurred over the years. I seem to have an uncanny ability of being part of the 0.01% of users who use these poorly (and often never) advertised features. While it is not directly related to the Live Bookmarks it is in relation to Firefox and Feature Removal. The discussion about vulnerabilities of using FF 36 that branched off is admittingly off topic - so if you're pruning this thread as a way to kill that conversation then it's less an action of questionable moderation and more a case of poorly worded moderation.
- dang 8y ago
  Ok, point taken. And that's not a duplicate comment.